Tag Archives | Tech

#PeoplePower: Using tech to promote activism

By Loren Treisman

All across Africa, social entrepreneurs are using mobile and web-based technology to hold government to account and demand the changes they need. It’s a powerful medium with a lot of potential to contribute towards social change. However, there is much to be done to ensure local ownership and maximise impact.  Protests are stirring across South […]


Inside | Loren Treisman

Loren

She has a PhD from Cambridge and expertise in international development, governance, health and the use of technology to spur social change. She’s the Executive of Indigo Trust, a grant-making foundation that supports tech-driven projects in Africa, particularly those involving innovation, transparency and citizen empowerment. Loren regularly presents at conferences and writes for the international press, including The Guardian, CNN and the BBC. She was named one of the 20 Powerful Women to Watch in 2014 in The Huffington Post. She also likes to go camping just about every weekend.

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Home-growing solutions

By Loren Treisman

 Loren’s thoughts on working from the inside out – when you come from outside the community (or even the country).  Indigo Trust is a UK-based foundation. But we believe that the best solutions to Africa’s challenges will be devised by citizens of Africa itself. Local communities have a deeper understanding of context and cultural nuance. They are […]


Inside | Loren Treisman

Loren

She has a PhD from Cambridge and expertise in international development, governance, health and the use of technology to spur social change. She’s the Executive of Indigo Trust, a grant-making foundation that supports tech-driven projects in Africa, particularly those involving innovation, transparency and citizen empowerment. Loren regularly presents at conferences and writes for the international press, including The Guardian, CNN and the BBC. She was named one of the 20 Powerful Women to Watch in 2014 in The Huffington Post. She also likes to go camping just about every weekend.

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On your marks, tech set, go!

By Mark van Dijk

Digital technology is flying into sci-fi-like places. But often, the innovations developed are inaccessible and unaffordable and therefore out of reach for the 84% of South Africans who rely on public healthcare. Not these ones.         Adapted from the 2014 Health Innovator’s Review, compiled by Inclusive Healthcare Innovation, a joint initiative between the […]


Inside | Mark van Dijk

Mark_van_Dijk
He’s an award-winning health and wellness writer, and deputy editor of Men’s Health magazine. “It’s been inspiring and hugely encouraging to hear the questions being asked by the healthcare industry’s most innovative minds,” says Mark of his experience working on the Health Innovator’s Review. “Questions like: What are the barriers to progress? How ready is your organisation for innovation? What are the most pressing needs?” As a journalist, Mark knows the most interesting answers come from asking the right questions. He lives in Cape Town with his wife, two daughters and their comic books.

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New opportunities in e-Learning

By Mark van Dijk

Opinion of Professor Wim de Villiers, Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town (UCT) For every 20 people in South Africa, there are 13 mobile phones. That’s according to a new report published by the GSMA, the body that represents the world’s mobile operators. That 65.7% penetration rate – the highest in Africa […]


Inside | Mark van Dijk

Mark_van_Dijk
He’s an award-winning health and wellness writer, and deputy editor of Men’s Health magazine. “It’s been inspiring and hugely encouraging to hear the questions being asked by the healthcare industry’s most innovative minds,” says Mark of his experience working on the Health Innovator’s Review. “Questions like: What are the barriers to progress? How ready is your organisation for innovation? What are the most pressing needs?” As a journalist, Mark knows the most interesting answers come from asking the right questions. He lives in Cape Town with his wife, two daughters and their comic books.

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Thoughts on tech with a purpose

By Osiame Molefe

To some people technology is not as interesting as its ability to empower, uplift and educate people. This is only done when technology is “democratised” and available more widely and cheaply. When it reaches people and so has a purpose. Let’s think about that for a moment. [wooslider slider_type=”attachments”] When Piet Strieker, a volunteer teacher […]


Inside | Osiame Molefe

Osiame_Molefe

Osiame Molefe is a chartered accountant who’s crunched numbers in Johannesburg, Bermuda and New York. But that was then. Now he’s a Cape Town-based writer who crafts words into news, opinion, analysis, public sector strategy and also some fiction. His interest is in, “the space where personal and societal ambitions intersect with technology, politics and economics”. Welcome to Osiame’s space. An interesting place to be.

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What’s on the slab at RLabs?

By Adele Shevel and Marc Low

All sorts of things, including new mobile platforms, up-skilling, counselling and support for all things techie and entrepreneurial. Oh yes, and also renewed hope for reformed gangsters and drug addicts. Lots of it. [wooslider slider_type=”attachments”] A few years ago Marlon Parker was pushing trolleys at the airport in Cape Town. He did not know what […]


Inside | Adele Shevel and Marc Low

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